All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[JackDaw]

I do not find it absurd. The point is sending the message to multi-millionaires who own valuable real estate in Manhattan and think they can get away with destroying the lives of poorer people, and to attack Democracy, that they cannot, indeed, do that and get to keep all their nice things. It's a check on power that comes with being rich.

As for Perry: Most people do not take drugs with the intention to overdose. When they do, that is called accidental. So the taking of the drug was intentional, the dying was accidental.

Cheers for info on Giuliani. (Hooray!)

On Matt Perry case...the reason I cast doubt on the "accident" aspect is that its patently obvious that a lot of people in US medical and pharmaceutical industries effectively encourage people to take stuff they would be better off not taking.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

It’s impossible to feel any sympathy for Giuliani, he’s the architect of his own misfortune…but I still feel the level of damages awarded is absurd.

I heard a report that the attorneys for those women only asked for $24 million. Sounds like the jury sent a message that what Giuliani had done to them was repugnant on steroids and he would pay through the nose for his actions. I for one didn't find that figure absurd, Giuliani chose to ride off that cliff supporting Trump, if he ends up broke or in prison, I'd be perfectly content with either outcome.

[Catlady in training]

German and Dutch authorities have arrested four members of Hamas who are said to have planned attacks on Jewish institutions in Europe, according to the German Federal Public Prosecutor's Office.




Also in Denmark.




Going to a big Christmas market in Bonn today. Wish me luck that I will not be blown up.

Man, the cultural enrichment is really paying off.

[Deathstroke]

Quick! Someone check Ivanna's grave!

Oh, and the jury in Rudy's defamation case has awarded Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss nearly $150 million dollars. Good for them, though they'll probably never see a dime.

EDIT: Oh, for f*cks sake. Rudy is giving a press conference on how this will be overturned, he wasn't allowed to present evidence, and is tripling down on his ridiculous claims against Freeman and Moss. Now they can do what E.Jean Caroll did and sue him AGAIN.

That fuckwad Giuliani is a clear and present danger to democracy as a whole. The women are never going to see any money but I hope they sue him repeatedly for every instance that he opens his lying mouth.

[Gray Lensman]

It’s impossible to feel any sympathy for Giuliani, he’s the architect of his own misfortune…but I still feel the level of damages awarded is absurd.

When someone is very wealthy, only an absurd fine can send a message. For a related example, Trump has been fined twice already for violating the court imposed gag order, but only for $5000 each time. While that's a lot of money for people like us, for someone poor it's crippling for years, but for Trump it's the equivalent of what you or I find as loose change in the couch cushions. Either being rich means you can break laws enforced by civil penalties with impunity, or the fines need to be absurd.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2014, "Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day" ran a profile of the former U.S. Congressman from Indiana, Dan Burton, a former head of the House Oversight Committee who used that body to conduct witch hunts against the Clinton administration all through the 1990s, including at one point subpoenaing the entire Christmas Card list of Bill and Hillary. Burton also claimed the Clintons had former aide Vince Foster murdered, conducting a recreation of his death using a cantaloupe and handgun in his yard for assembled reporters, and further enflamed the insanity of conspiracy theorists by releasing false data about what happened at the Branch Davidian compound, in Waco, Texas, during the cult’s standoff with the Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. After becoming appreciably more quiet during the Bush administration, in 2009, the uglier side of Rep. Burton returned, as he started signing on to Birther Bills, making false statements about Barack Obama conducting deals to get George Soros rich, and in the middle of a Congressional hearing on autism, trying to use data gathered by disgraced doctor Andrew Wakefield to prove a link between autism and vaccines. Burton finally retired in 2012, and is now in his eighties.

In both 2015, in 2016, and in 2017, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” posted profiles of Ada Fisher, a highly anti-gay member of the Republican National Committee and failed political candidate from North Carolina who unsuccessfully ran for office to be a U.S. Senator in 2002 against Elizabeth Dole , then cried foul to complain that she wasn’t allowed to participate in television forums. In 2004 and 2006 she attempted to challenge Congressman Mel Watt in North Carolina’s 12th District, losing handily both times. Fisher supports the nutty idea of adopting a flat tax, and on immigration, runs to the right of even former President Bush, whose guest worker program, she classified as “amnesty”. Fisher has a few typical conservative positions like how she is opposed to gay marriage. Her argument, though, seems limited to the fact that gays should have to wait, because ”Marriage ought to be between one man and one woman at one time, and I'm still waiting.” Fisher’s tantrum after losing to Elizabeth Dole was not a run-off, but somewhat of a pattern of behavior, as she also threw a fit when a candidate other than the one she supported for the Chairman of the Republican National Committee won back in 2009. About six weeks into Michael Steele being elected, Fisher was trying to drum up support to get his resignation, in effect asking for the election to be conducted again until a result she liked occurred. The same thing happened in the 2015 GOP Primary race in Mississippi for Thad Cochran’s U.S. Senate seat, when she wanted Reince Priebus to investigate how Chris McDaniel could have lost to Cochran, volunteering herself to look into “racism” that led to Cochran’s victory. Fisher’s notorious about being so reactionary on both sides of the aisle, and if you need another example, there was the time in 2010 when she e-mailed the media a link to the following Youtube video she saw a poorly edited Youtube video that admitted to being made of “snippets” of President Obama, but Fisher seemed generally conflicted if it was legitimate, or made of out of context sound bites when her message asked, ”This tape should be investigated and verified. I am not an expert ontapes but if this isn't doctored we have a constitutional issue of humongous proportions to deal with.” That wasn’t Fisher’s only time taking shots at President Obama, by any stretch. In 2008, while campaigning for Sen. John McCain during his presidential run, Fisher tried saying that Obama should never be president because he admitted to using marijuana in his book, and that should disqualify him from the office. The media asked her how President Clinton could have held office, after his own discussions about marijuana, and all of the discussions about President Bush’s previous cocaine use, and she actually tried saying that it’s okay for a presidential candidate to have used drugs… so long as they lied about it and never admitted it. The last we heard from her, she was putting out editorials where she seemly like she was trying to convince herself that Donald Trump wouldn't keep ties to his businesses to avoid conflicts of interests (Hint: He didn’t exactly, because his children still have controlling interests in his company, and get regular updates from dad). If you were wondering to what depths of selling out Fisher might stoop to, well, in August 2017, only days after the attacks by Neo-Nazis and White Nationalists in Charlottesville, she was oddly silent about the bigotry and hatred of the Alt-Right. What she was far more concerned with, and wrote an op-ed about was seeing an African American woman but a noose around the neck of a Confederate statue in Durham, North Carolina, and bring it down. At this point, the question isn’t if Fisher is drinking the GOP’s Kool-Aid, but whether she has drank so much that she is, at this point, the Kool-Aid Man.

On this date in 2018, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Tony Cornish, a former police chief, and now former member of the Minnesota House of Representatives, serving District 23B from 2003 through 2017. Over the course of his last decade in office, his voting record grew more and more extreme, with four separative votes to block minimum wage increases, votes for stricter Voter ID Laws to suppress the vote, plenty of strict anti-choice legislation including bills he co-sponsored, his vote for transphobic bathroom legislation to be applied at schools, and not just a vote against legalizing same sex marriage, but his vote to ban same sex marriage completely, instead. But that isn’t the reason why we’ve chosen to take time out to profile Tony Cornish a little over a year after he left office. No, we’re highlighting him for being a serial sexual harasser while in office, including not just a Democratic colleague, but other staffers from both sides of the aisle. After Democratic Rep. Erin Quade came forward, a lobbyist came forward and said she received a string of texts from Cornish trying to solicit sexual favor s from her. At first, Cornish denied all the accusations, but when the former Minnesota Speaker of the House came forward to say he had warned Cornish about similar behavior back in 2012, over two dozen other accusers came forward to report him for sexual harassment, and the media noticed Cornish’s ex-wife filed a protection order against him back in 1990… Only then did Tony Cornish resign.

On this date in 2019, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Todd Rokita, the former U.S. House Representative from Indiana’s 4th Congressional District from 2011 to 2019. In 2016, he attempted to succeed Mike Pence to be the next Governor of Indiana, but lost in the GOP Primary to Eric Holcomb. But it was back in 2000 that Todd Rokita first cut his teeth in Republican politics by serving as legal counsel for several Florida counties during the lengthy recount into the presidential election that got handed to George W. Bush, and his interest in manipulating elections continued on into his tenure as Indiana Secretary of State in 2005, when he pushed for that state’s Voter ID law to help suppress the vote. On policy, Todd Rokita might not have embarrassed himself on cable news as often as some of his counterparts, but he was representing the second most conservative district in all of Indiana, and thus could support Donald Trump’s Muslim ban, or go to a town hall and declare that admitting a link between human activity and climate change was “arrogant”. His voting record saw him support the scores of failed attempts at repealing the Affordable Care Act, twice supporting failed efforts to defund Planned Parenthood, opposition to disaster relief for victims of Hurricane Sandy in 2013, a vote for the 2013 Government Shutdown and then voting to keep the government closed in the final vote to reopen it, and generally voting in lockstep with the most conservative bills without any thought from 2011-2018. In 2018, Rokita attempted to get elected to the U.S. Senate, and got into an ugly, ugly primary against Mike Braun and Luke Messer. It wasn’t just the fact that Rokita was pathetic enough to campaign in a MAGA hat with a cardboard cutout of Donald Trump, or all the mudslinging he dove into… it perhaps was not the best idea to air an ad featuring Rokita shooting an AR-15 only days after the Parkland shooting, spliced in between footage of Colin Kaepernick kneeling to protest police violence during the national anthem at NFL games. But Rokita also had ghosts from his time serving as Indiana’s Secretary of State coming back to haunt him, as it was revealed he was using state resources to aid himself in winning elections, effectively using a record of political donations as his own personal rolodex. Rokita even tried winning over Republican primary voters by denying the American intelligence communities analysis that Russia interfered in the 2016 election, and defended Donald Trump after he was completely dominated by Vladimir Putin at their Helsinki summit. He only got 30% of the vote, losing by double digits.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2021, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Vernon Jones, who from 2017 through 2020, served District 91 of the Georgia House of Representatives as a Democrat. He also served in District 57 of that body from 1993-1994, and had an unsuccessful bid for Senate in 2008, as well as one for the House in 2010 in Georgia’s 4th Congressional District. In April 2020, Jones started campaigning for Donald Trump, said he was resigning from office (but stayed until the end of his term) and made it official in January of 2021… he officially made his party affiliation Republican. He was also a failed 2020 GOP Primary challenger to Gov. Brian Kemp. Throughout his career, Jones has had several incidents where he has threatened women, and in one instance in 2004, was accused of rape, but no charges were ever pressed after DeKalb County police tipped off Jones of the accusation prior to the victim filing charges. He has accused of stealing taxpayer money, and while serving as DeKalb County CEO, spent $800,000 on a security detail at taxpayer expense. and was noted as having kept a portrait of Confederate General Robert E. Lee in his office. Jones’ party loyalties were in question due to his voting twice for George W. Bush, how during his 2008 Senate campaign he made misleading posters that posed him along side Barack Obama that said “YES WE CAN” that led Obama to have to point out he had never even met the guy, let alone was endorsing him, Also through his career, he has run into campaign finance irregularities, his voting record showed he was firmly opposed to LGBTQ rights, and also that he was anti-choice, even voting for fetal heartbeat anti-abortion legislation. As we look and see Jones’ record of problematic behavior and support for conservative causes, it seems clearer that he only filed to run as a Democrat to reach office and hoped no one would notice. Endorsing Donald Trump was pretty much the big reveal, seeing him speaking at the 2020 RNC was the “no turning back” point… but when he went crowd-surfing at a MAGA rally in October of 2020 without a mask on, through a maskless crowd during a pandemic, it was pretty clear this guy was an incredible dumbass. The virus had already killed 220,000 people by that point, and there he went… Vernon Jones did just about everything Trump wanted to try to help his re-election campaign, including speaking at the “Stop the Steal” rally at the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, prior to Trump taking the stage to incite the mob himself. That was the speech where Jones decided to announce he was a Republican, joining up just in time for the Trump crowd of domestic terrorists to go attempt a failed coup on Trump’s behalf. Given Trump’s history of racism, it seemed the partnership of the two to try and garner support from the black community in Georgia was always cynical at best. That’s why we think the entry of David Perdue into the 2022 Senate primary claiming HE is supported by Trump can’t be a coincidence, and Trump’s about to leave Jones high and dry.

On this date in 2022, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Alex Skarlatos, who was a 2020 and 2022 candidate for U.S. House of Representatives in Oregon’s 4th Congressional District, a Greek immigrant to the United States who rose to fame with two other servicemen after while serving in the United States National Guard, foiled an attempted terror attack on a train in Paris back in 2015. Aiding in the effort to subdue the gunman earned him medals from both President Barack Obama, and French President Francois Hollande. His fame has helped him appear on game shows, reality shows, and Clint Eastwood directed the film depicting his heroism. For this, we tip our hat for Skarlatos. However, as can be the case, fame can go to someone’s head, and sometimes people are willing to say or do questionable things to get elected. And that’s where we have some red flags to report. Sure, allegedly committing campaign finance violations in a desperate bid to fund a run for office would be a big negative, but it’s the vibe of being a creep sexually that permeated Skarlatos’ 2022 run. Then there’s apparently a pattern that was noticed of Skarlatos popping up on the accounts of teenage girls taking bikini photos and posting them to Instagram, with him “liking” girls as young as 15. Y’know, great look from a guy in the same party jumping up and down about supposed “grooming” happening on the left. Another big unforced error? Going onto a podcast and talking about choking women during sex, including admitting he’d considered what he’d have to do if he killed his partner while enjoying some choke-play, and cracking jokes about a woman who actually choked to death while performing oral sex on her partner in Florida and no charges were filed. There was also his sexist take on his former dance partner from Dancing with the Stars, Emma Slater, who he lamented was dating someone because he wanted to “jump on that”, and that he thought he was single because in his hometown of Rosenberg, there are “only two hotties”, and that his time there is summarized as “Story of my life, just jacking it in Oregon.” Maybe referring to most of the women in the district you’re running as “not hotties” isn’t a smart campaigning tactic, because Alex Skarlatos lost to veteran Congressman Peter DeFazio with 46% of the vote in 2020, Democrat Val Hoyle in the 2022 general election, getting just 43% of the vote. We’ll have to see if he tries to produce a new low in a third attempt in 2024. It might help if he actually started to explain where he actually stands on issues, rather than just run on two medals he received. We will set aside his profile at this time to profile another wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 1265-60, since this was established in July 2014.


Joel Koskan
Welcome to what is the 1265th original profile here at “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day”, where we’ll be profiling Joel Koskan, who was a 2022 candidate for District 26 of the South Dakota State Senate, his third failed attempt to return to office which he left in 2006. We’re not really going to get into his politics, and his pro-gun stance. Although, it is interesting that he voted against an exception to abortion bans in the state if the woman was a victim of rape or incest…

Only days before the mid-term elections, Joel Koskan was arrested for child abuse against his adopted daughter, starting from when she was 12 and that lasted for years. Koskan plead guilty, but his plea deal was thrown out, and he was sentenced to ten years in prison.

In spite of being indicted for sexual abuse and incest… 41.7% of the voters in District 26 of the South Dakota State Senate voted for Joel Koskan, because hey… there was an “R” next to his name, and you can’t let a Democrat win just because the alternative is a pedophile, right Republican voters? Because you just can’t allow some Democrat to win! They’re a bunch of groomers!

The GOP is a cult. Full stop.

[Guild]

On this date in 2021, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Vernon Jones, who from 2017 through 2020, served District 91 of the Georgia House of Representatives as a Democrat. He also served in District 57 of that body from 1993-1994, and had an unsuccessful bid for Senate in 2008, as well as one for the House in 2010 in Georgia’s 4th Congressional District. In April 2020, Jones started campaigning for Donald Trump, said he was resigning from office (but stayed until the end of his term) and made it official in January of 2021… he officially made his party affiliation Republican. He was also a failed 2020 GOP Primary challenger to Gov. Brian Kemp. Throughout his career, Jones has had several incidents where he has threatened women, and in one instance in 2004, was accused of rape, but no charges were ever pressed after DeKalb County police tipped off Jones of the accusation prior to the victim filing charges. He has accused of stealing taxpayer money, and while serving as DeKalb County CEO, spent $800,000 on a security detail at taxpayer expense. and was noted as having kept a portrait of Confederate General Robert E. Lee in his office. Jones’ party loyalties were in question due to his voting twice for George W. Bush, how during his 2008 Senate campaign he made misleading posters that posed him along side Barack Obama that said “YES WE CAN” that led Obama to have to point out he had never even met the guy, let alone was endorsing him, Also through his career, he has run into campaign finance irregularities, his voting record showed he was firmly opposed to LGBTQ rights, and also that he was anti-choice, even voting for fetal heartbeat anti-abortion legislation. As we look and see Jones’ record of problematic behavior and support for conservative causes, it seems clearer that he only filed to run as a Democrat to reach office and hoped no one would notice. Endorsing Donald Trump was pretty much the big reveal, seeing him speaking at the 2020 RNC was the “no turning back” point… but when he went crowd-surfing at a MAGA rally in October of 2020 without a mask on, through a maskless crowd during a pandemic, it was pretty clear this guy was an incredible dumbass. The virus had already killed 220,000 people by that point, and there he went… Vernon Jones did just about everything Trump wanted to try to help his re-election campaign, including speaking at the “Stop the Steal” rally at the U.S. Capitol on January 6th, prior to Trump taking the stage to incite the mob himself. That was the speech where Jones decided to announce he was a Republican, joining up just in time for the Trump crowd of domestic terrorists to go attempt a failed coup on Trump’s behalf. Given Trump’s history of racism, it seemed the partnership of the two to try and garner support from the black community in Georgia was always cynical at best. That’s why we think the entry of David Perdue into the 2022 Senate primary claiming HE is supported by Trump can’t be a coincidence, and Trump’s about to leave Jones high and dry.

On this date in 2022, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” profiled Alex Skarlatos, who was a 2020 and 2022 candidate for U.S. House of Representatives in Oregon’s 4th Congressional District, a Greek immigrant to the United States who rose to fame with two other servicemen after while serving in the United States National Guard, foiled an attempted terror attack on a train in Paris back in 2015. Aiding in the effort to subdue the gunman earned him medals from both President Barack Obama, and French President Francois Hollande. His fame has helped him appear on game shows, reality shows, and Clint Eastwood directed the film depicting his heroism. For this, we tip our hat for Skarlatos. However, as can be the case, fame can go to someone’s head, and sometimes people are willing to say or do questionable things to get elected. And that’s where we have some red flags to report. Sure, allegedly committing campaign finance violations in a desperate bid to fund a run for office would be a big negative, but it’s the vibe of being a creep sexually that permeated Skarlatos’ 2022 run. Then there’s apparently a pattern that was noticed of Skarlatos popping up on the accounts of teenage girls taking bikini photos and posting them to Instagram, with him “liking” girls as young as 15. Y’know, great look from a guy in the same party jumping up and down about supposed “grooming” happening on the left. Another big unforced error? Going onto a podcast and talking about choking women during sex, including admitting he’d considered what he’d have to do if he killed his partner while enjoying some choke-play, and cracking jokes about a woman who actually choked to death while performing oral sex on her partner in Florida and no charges were filed. There was also his sexist take on his former dance partner from Dancing with the Stars, Emma Slater, who he lamented was dating someone because he wanted to “jump on that”, and that he thought he was single because in his hometown of Rosenberg, there are “only two hotties”, and that his time there is summarized as “Story of my life, just jacking it in Oregon.” Maybe referring to most of the women in the district you’re running as “not hotties” isn’t a smart campaigning tactic, because Alex Skarlatos lost to veteran Congressman Peter DeFazio with 46% of the vote in 2020, Democrat Val Hoyle in the 2022 general election, getting just 43% of the vote. We’ll have to see if he tries to produce a new low in a third attempt in 2024. It might help if he actually started to explain where he actually stands on issues, rather than just run on two medals he received. We will set aside his profile at this time to profile another wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 1265-60, since this was established in July 2014.


Joel Koskan
Welcome to what is the 1265th original profile here at “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day”, where we’ll be profiling Joel Koskan, who was a 2022 candidate for District 26 of the South Dakota State Senate, his third failed attempt to return to office which he left in 2006. We’re not really going to get into his politics, and his pro-gun stance. Although, it is interesting that he voted against an exception to abortion bans in the state if the woman was a victim of rape or incest…

Only days before the mid-term elections, Joel Koskan was arrested for child abuse against his adopted daughter, starting from when she was 12 and that lasted for years. Koskan plead guilty, but his plea deal was thrown out, and he was sentenced to ten years in prison.

In spite of being indicted for sexual abuse and incest… 41.7% of the voters in District 26 of the South Dakota State Senate voted for Joel Koskan, because hey… there was an “R” next to his name, and you can’t let a Democrat win just because the alternative is a pedophile, right Republican voters? Because you just can’t allow some Democrat to win! They’re a bunch of groomers!

The GOP is a cult. Full stop.

I think partisan news shoulders a lot of the blame for citizens being suspicious of self-serving hit pieces than objective information on politicians regardless of where they stand politically. And I wouldn't throw stones on shallow voters to the right. If not for the D in front of presidential or vice-presidential candidates, skin color and sex were as deep as many voters were willing to look.

[Malvolio]

Cheers for info on Giuliani. (Hooray!)

On Matt Perry case...the reason I cast doubt on the "accident" aspect is that its patently obvious that a lot of people in US medical and pharmaceutical industries effectively encourage people to take stuff they would be better off not taking.

Doctors will often prescribe a med to a patient, a patient they know has had addiction issues, with the warning, "you say you're in recovery, so I will take your word, but warn you, DO NOT take more than the prescribed dosage." But at some point, the patient's addictive personality takes over and they think, "if 2 of these every 4 hours is good, then 4 of these every 2 hours is better!" That doesn't make the doctor responsible for the overdose, but it does make the overdose intentional on the part of the patient.

[Jack Dracula]

I heard a report that the attorneys for those women only asked for $24 million. Sounds like the jury sent a message that what Giuliani had done to them was repugnant on steroids and he would pay through the nose for his actions. I for one didn't find that figure absurd, Giuliani chose to ride off that cliff supporting Trump, if he ends up broke or in prison, I'd be perfectly content with either outcome.

It’s important these precedents are being set. In the age of social media lives and livelihoods can be destroyed with a few comments from someone with a moderately large following. There need to be some legal checks on that situation. People with outsized influence should face outsized consequences for bad behavior.

[Gray Lensman]

I heard a report that the attorneys for those women only asked for $24 million. Sounds like the jury sent a message that what Giuliani had done to them was repugnant on steroids and he would pay through the nose for his actions. I for one didn't find that figure absurd, Giuliani chose to ride off that cliff supporting Trump, if he ends up broke or in prison, I'd be perfectly content with either outcome.

I'm pretty sure that going out on the courthouse steps and continuing to say the very things that he was sued for, while the judgement was being deliberated no less, might have something to do with the amount of the judgement.

[Jack Dracula]

When someone is very wealthy, only an absurd fine can send a message. For a related example, Trump has been fined twice already for violating the court imposed gag order, but only for $5000 each time. While that's a lot of money for people like us, for someone poor it's crippling for years, but for Trump it's the equivalent of what you or I find as loose change in the couch cushions. Either being rich means you can break laws enforced by civil penalties with impunity, or the fines need to be absurd.

I’m wondering how a multimillion dollar fine affects the credit rating for those people. The wealthy typically live off bank loans taken out against their personal assets. A fine like that has to affect that whole situation.

[Farealmer]

Man, the cultural enrichment is really paying off.

I am shocked you said this. Much of what you say I tend to agree with but this was too much.

[shooshoomanjoe]

Yea. There's some low key Islamaphobia by a few members of this forum.

[Tami]

Sheesh.....

IDF says Israeli hostages it killed in Gaza were bare chested and waving white flag

One of the men was carrying a stick with a white cloth tied to it and all had removed their shirts. Spotting the three, an Israeli soldier on a rooftop opened fire, shouting “Terrorists!”

While two of the hostages fell to the ground immediately, the third fled into a nearby building. When a commander arrived on the scene, the unit was ordered into the building where soldiers killed the third hostage despite his pleas for help in Hebrew.

It emerged too that the IDF had identified a nearby building marked with “SOS” and “Help! Three hostages” two days earlier but had believed it might be a trap.

As the first details of the killing were released by the IDF on Friday night, after most Israelis had begun to mark Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest, a hastily called demonstration converged on the Kirya, a military headquarters compound in Tel Aviv.

Chanting “Shame”, “There’s no time” and “Deal now!” – the last a demand for a new ceasefire agreement with Hamas and a hostage exchange – the protesters represent a growing thread of anger in Israel at the way in which the war is being prosecuted, as the situation of the remaining hostages in Gaza has taken a series of dark of turns in the past week.

And the US is still trying to reign Israel in

For Palestinians in Gaza, the continuing trajectory of Israel’s two-month long offensive is writ large in terms of daily deaths and suffering, amid mounting hunger and disease.

With the death toll – civilian and combatant – now almost 19,000 according to the Hamas-run health ministry in the coastal strip, whole neighbourhoods have been reduced largely to rubble and 1.8 million of the strip’s population of 2.3 million internally displaced.

All of which has fuelled an escalating humanitarian crisis that has been driving the wider international discomfort, not least in Washington, Israel’s closest ally.

Even as senior Israeli officials insisted they need further months to complete their campaign against Hamas, the message from Biden – delivered by Sullivan– was clear.

Discussions, said a US official after the meeting, were focused on “a shift in emphasis from high-tempo clearance operations, high-intensity clearance operations, which are ongoing now, to ultimately lower-intensity focus on high-value targets, intelligence-driven raids, and those sorts of more narrow, surgical military objectives.”

While US officials have said in public they do not wish to impose a timeline for that transition, privately it is clear that the Biden administration is pushing for an end to major combat operations by the end of December, convinced that Israel’s intensive bombing campaign is militarily